Frontpage Features

BY RON BARR

One of the things I enjoy about covering sports is the unique and unexpected ways the outcome of games is decided.  Add the human element, unexpected breaks and a special athlete’s effort and you have what makes sports appealing and exciting to fans.  Super Bowl 44 is another example.

There’s no understanding the ebb and flow, or change in momentum of a game, especially a championship game.  The smallest thing can change that flow or momentum.  The Colts jumped out to a 10-0 lead in Super Bowl 44, scoring the first two times Peyton Manning and his offense got the ball.  The Saints looked like a team that had never been to a Super Bowl before, which they hadn’t.  They were trying to figure things out.  Manning made it harder to do that with his typical surgeon like pass receptions, in multiple offensive sets.  The flow was with the Colts in the first quarter.

But, the momentum changed to the Saints after Colts receiver Pierre Garcon dropped a Manning pass.  It stopped what appeared to be another scoring drive.  If Indianapolis had scored again, either a field goal or a touchdown, the Saints may never have recovered.  It steadied the Saints and the flow changed toward New Orleans as they came back to score two field goals before halftime.

Great coaches make great decisions and Sean Payton made a tough and potentially controversial call just before halftime with his Saints driving for a touchdown that would have tied the game at 10-10.  From two yards out, he ran the ball two times and failed to score.  The last one was a 4th and 2 call.  Certainly Payton could have been second-guessed for going for the touchdown instead of taking the sure 3 points.  But, by going for the touchdown, he showed confidence in his offense and decided they would stay true to the philosophy that got them to the Championship game.  The Saints were here because all season long they had been aggressive and always tried to dictate the tempo of the game.

Wisely, Payton decided that this game, this moment, wasn’t a time to change that approach.  As it turned out, even though the Colts stopped them from scoring any points, the Saints called timeouts effectively enough to allow New Orleans to kick a field goal with :36 seconds left in the half that cut the Colts lead to 10-6.

In preparation for playing the Colts, Payton realized the best way to beat Indianapolis would be to keep Manning and his offense off the field as much as possible.  And, to limit the number of times and chances they’d have to score.  Since New Orleans won the toss and took the opening kickoff, the Colts would get the second half kickoff, thus giving Manning another chance to set the tempo for the second half and a chance to add to their 10-6 lead.  Payton’s decision to open the second half with a successfully recovered onside kick was the biggest play and decision of the game.

It took Drew Brees and the Saints less than 3 and a half minutes to take their first lead at 13-10 on Pierre Thomas’ 16 yard touchdown reception.  Here is where New Orleans won the game.  The onside kick and ensuing touchdown allowed the Saints to continue their late first half domination of the Colts and set them up to control the tempo for the rest of the game.  A tempo that continued throughout the entire second half and nailed down their first Super Bowl win.

In preparing for their first Super Bowl appearance, Payton said that he “plagiarized” the late Bill Walsh’s preparation and game approach.  The onside kick and dictating the tempo of the game was right out of Walsh’s play book.  As a friend of Walsh’s and the play-by-play announcer for Stanford when Walsh was the coach, many times I saw Walsh beat better teams, with better players, simply by creating mis-matches and dictating the tempo of the game.

Walsh’s opponents would become frustrated and beaten.  I saw the same thing in Payton’s game plan and execution against the Colts.
Peyton Manning is a great player, and great players make it possible for their teams to win no matter the score or how dire the situation looks late in the game.  He brought the Colts back to take the lead momentarily on a Joseph Addai touchdown run, but it would turn out to be the only score the Colts would get in the second half.  Drew Brees was the equal to Manning, completing 32 of 39 passes, for nearly 300 yards.  Manning and Brees are the epitome of what I said earlier about the ability and efforts of special athletes to make sports unique, exciting, special and appealing to fans.

New Orleans never broke character and closed out the victory with Garrett Hartley’s third field goal (all from 40 plus yards), a Jeremy Shockey 2 yard TD reception and the dagger that ended any doubt, Tracey Porter’s 74 yard touchdown interception with a little more than 3 minutes left.  Final score: New Orleans 31, Indianapolis 17.

I can think of only one word to sum up Super Bowl 44: satisfying.  Two great quarterbacks, a gambling, single-minded coach in Sean Payton, tough, fast defenses and a Saints team that had confidence in who they were and how they got to this game.  Satisfying is the best that any player, coach or fan ever ask for in a sports contest.  It was a privilege and a pleasure to watch such a contest.

I’m Ron Barr.

Ron Barr is an Emmy award winning writer and the host of the nationally and internationally syndicated sports talk show, Sports Byline USA.